6/24/2010 @ 6:00AM

E-Mail That Self Destructs

Many a lawsuit these days turns on the discovery of embarrassing e-mails and instant messaging records sent by executives or politicians. A conversation two people might once have had in the hallway, done and gone as soon as the words left their lips, these days become subject to legal discovery.

In some regulated industries, such as stock trading, there are requirements for e-mail and IM logs to be archived. But in the absence of such a requirement, it makes sense to think twice about what you keep and what you dispose of–or never store in the first place. Technology is available to make electronic communications more ephemeral.

VaporStream, a product for confidential electronic communications, caused a bit of a stir when it was unveiled. When the VaporStream software is installed on a computer or a smartphone, messages disappear from the sender’s computing device the minute they are sent and disappear from the recipient’s device the moment they are read or replied to. It’s not really e-mail, or at least not standard e-mail, although the software is available as a plug-in to Outlook and other e-mail clients. The communication is peer-to-peer, so messages are never stored on any intermediary server the way they are with standard e-mail. The software also prevents messages from being printed or forwarded, and file attachments can be viewed but not saved. Or at least those are the company’s claims.

At the time of VaporStream’s debut, one columnist suggested it would be a handy tool for terrorists communicating over the Internet. I don’t follow the logic, since e-mail encryption has long been available for those motivated to use it. The issue here is not about keeping the transmission of electronic communications private, but instead, about preventing them from being stored on computers, servers and devices.

One can’t help thinking of Jim Phelps watching his Impossible Mission Force instructions go up in smoke right after the “this tape will self destruct in five seconds” warning.

Scott Grady, the CEO of TIP Capital, had a less melodramatic reason for needing VaporStream. His team isn’t secretly overthrowing dictators, but it does deal with some confidential information just by being in the business of providing financing for computer equipment. “We’re dealing with a lot of client information and credit information. We have a pretty good idea when someone starts increasing their data center 25 or 50% that something is going to happen–they’re about to come out with a tremendous new product, or they’re close to buying someone. We may not know exactly, but we have a pretty good sense of when something big is going on,” he says.

In order to maintain the confidence of its customers, TIP Capital needs to keep those details to itself. Some customers, particularly in the health care industry, “make us sign 10-page non-disclosure agreements just to get in the door,” Grady says.

TIP employs about 55 people, but the use of VaporStream is limited to the executive team and managers involved in discussing deals or potential deals. Because he travels a lot, Grady says he often uses the software on his BlackBerry to send a message from an airport lounge, where a private voice conversation would be impossible.

VaporStream offers a 60-day free trial, after which the pricing starts at $7.50 per user per month. Both the sender and the receiver need a copy of the software for the communication to work. TIP’s Grady says he has talked to clients about using it to communicate with his firm, but as a practical matter it’s so far limited to internal company communications.

VaporStream CEO Joseph Collins says the health care industry is one that is especially interested in his product because of the strict privacy requirements of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. “There are absolutely uses where you wouldn’t want to use VaporStream,” he acknowledges, such as transmitting medical records that need to be retained. On the other hand, he says, there are times when doctors want to be able to have “a quick, casual conversation–the medical term is a ‘curbside,’” and VaporStream lets them do that electronically but confidentially.

Part of the reason electronic discovery of documents has become such a phenomenon is that cheap storage has made it possible for organizations to keep everything. Collins says technologies like VaporStream are a way of restoring balance. “You want to keep what you need to keep, and you don’t want to keep anything else,” he says.